Friday, April 08, 2011

In the comments section of another Honduran blogger, I opined that I've come to the view that Honduras is a 'semi-failed state', on the road to full-fledged 'failed state' status. Things just don't work in Honduras, basic things, uncomplicated things... The list is quite long...education, lack of security, sanitation, water, etc., etc. On top of it all is the endemic corruption that is pervasive throughout the country, at all levels of government and society.

Last year, Honduras had an exceptionally rainy wet season, but yet was unable to fill its reservoirs. Due to a lack of maintenance, it had to release the water and now faces water shortages again. Honduras has one of the highest murder rates in the world and is unable to provide security to its citizens.

But one of the symptoms of its 'semi-failed state' status that really bugs me is the fact that its postal system doesn't work. According to stories I've heard, it used to work...albeit 30-40 years ago. Then there was so much corruption and theft in the post office that people were afraid to mail anything, assuming that it would be stolen and never reach its destination. So people quit utilizing the postal system, and little by little it quit functioning.

The result is that now, whenever you want to pay a bill, instead of dropping a check in the mail, you must go to a bank, wait in line for 20-30 minutes to pay your bill. The chances are that the bank's system is down, but you don't know this until you've waited for what seems an eternity. So, you have to go back the next day and try again. To make it worse, you can't pay all your bills at just one bank. No... This is Honduras. It just has to be time consuming and frustrating. So you pay your water bill at one bank, school tuition at another, electric bill at another, and cable bill somewhere else, etc., etc.

If all the hours wasted by literally hundreds of thousands of people monthly, doing nothing but standing in lines over and over again were funneled into a productive activity, something could actually be accomplished. But no, since people can't trust the post office, it has withered away into nothingness and a whole nation is condemned to waiting in useless lines.

Someday, I'm going to do an experiment and post a letter to my father in law since I know he actually has a 'buzon' (mailbox). I will let you know whether it is ever received and how long it takes.